A Mortal Bane (11 page)

Bell blinked, looked away from her face to the cloak she had removed and carried now over her arm, but what he saw was a firm and shapely bosom and, falling over her shoulder, tresses of thick, shining, honey-gold hair exposed by the loosening of her veil. The cloak. Bell forced his eyes to look at something that was not part of a seemingly perfect woman. The cloak was a decent, sober brown, modest until one noticed it was of the very best cloth and lined with fur. A whore…perhaps, but no common woman for all of that.

“Magdalene,” the bishop was saying. “This is Sir Bellamy of Itchen, my knight. I suppose you would call him my man-of-all-work. He hires and trains men-at-arms, he corrects those who will not listen to gentler remonstrances; he was the one who drove out the harpies that were infesting the Old Priory Guesthouse before you came to take it. I want you to tell him your tale—the tale you told me, not the one you told Brother Paulinus. He also knew and liked Baldassare—”

“Baldassare?” Bell echoed. “You do not mean to tell me that he was the one who was killed?”

“I am afraid so, but I am not sure,” Magdalene said.

“What do you mean, you are not sure?”

“No, no,” the bishop put in. “Do not begin in the middle as you did with me. Remember, the whole story.”

The warning. Bell thought, was not only for the woman. He colored faintly—the curse of his fair complexion—knowing that the bishop had seen how hard her beauty had struck him. And her displeasure, Bell thought further and felt his color deepen, was not because of what the bishop had said but because she, too, had seen his admiration, and did not welcome it. Well, beauty or not, she was safe. He was not going to meddle with William of Ypres’s woman.

“Very well,” Magdalene said.

“Not here, though,” the bishop remarked. “I will need this chamber for business. Take him back to the guesthouse with you. Perhaps he can think of things he wishes to ask your women. One of them might have noticed something you did not. And, oh, I just remembered some other business I need to discuss with him. Wait outside.”

“Yes, my lord,” Magdalene said with a cold look at Bell.

I hope what you tell him is to keep his hands off, she thought as she closed the door behind her. Because Guiscard called me “whore,” doubtless that self-satisfied churl will think I will yield my body to ensure a favorable report from him to the bishop.

Within, much the same ideas, only from the opposite point of view, were being voiced. “Have a care,” the bishop was saying. “I know she is a woman of almost transcendent beauty and it is hard, even for me, to question what she says. You must. You
must
discover who killed Baldassare and discover what he was carrying and who has it now. You must get the pope’s messages back for me or, if they have been destroyed, discover that fact so that
I
can send to Innocent, tell him what happened, and ask him to send duplicates.”

“Can you tell me what you think was in the messages?”

“What I
think
he had was the result of the challenge Matilda made to the king’s right to the throne. It is almost impossible that Innocent could deny Stephen’s right since his legate already approved it, but the letter will quiet doubts. I can see that Matilda’s party might not want the pope’s final approval of Stephen to become public if they plan another rebellion. Still, it is hard to believe that would be worth killing over.”

“It might be,” Bell said slowly. “It might make the difference between a large number of men swearing to Matilda because they once promised the old king to support her. The pope’s decision would ease their consciences and keep them faithful to King Stephen.”

Winchester sighed and shrugged. “Perhaps. The only other thing he might have been carrying is the answer to Stephen’s request that I be made papal legate, and I cannot see how that could be important to anyone but me.”

“You think not, my lord? I am not sure the new archbishop would want a legate to overshadow him, nor that Waleran de Meulan would want you to hold the church in your hand while he tries to name his cousins to earldoms and bishoprics.”

“Theobald of Bec is no murderer,” Winchester said shortly. “Perhaps Waleran would not stop at murder…. Oh, Lord be my help. That was what she meant when she said William of Ypres would be glad to see my enemies discomfited.”

“She? Magdalene?” Bell asked. “Is she close enough to Ypres to know his mind?”

“He has been her friend and protector for a long time. He was the one who urged me to rent her the Old Priory Guesthouse, and I know he uses her house more for political meetings and other purposes he holds private than he does for satisfaction of his lust. I know it seems an odd place to go to keep secrets, but William is no fool and I have never heard he was disappointed.”

“Then she is presumably trustworthy.”

“I am sure she is…to William of Ypres. Does that warranty that she would be equally trustworthy to us?”

“No,” Bell said reluctantly. “His purposes are often not ours, although if it is Waleran de Meulan who ordered Baldassare killed, Ypres’s purpose and ours might be the same.”

‘True, but we cannot be sure that Ypres is involved in this. I only heard his name from Magdalene, who is a very clever woman and might want us to believe that while she pursued other purposes entirely. She may look like an angel, but a whore lives by selling—her body or anything else that will bring a profit. Not that I think special ill of Magdalene; she does her work and it is necessary, like that of collectors of dung. But you must remember that all whores are for sale—that is their trade.”

“You know her to be dishonest and deceitful?” Bell asked, keeping his voice flat. It was awful to think that could be so, to find that such beauty hid utter corruption, like the rainbow sheen on a slice of long-rotted meat.

“No,” Winchester said. “Oddly enough, my knowledge of her is just the opposite. In the time I have known Magdalene, I have found her honest and reliable. She has fulfilled every promise she made when she took the Old Priory Guesthouse; she pays her rent on time and in full; no one has made any complaint against her—not the men she serves nor her neighbors. But she
is
a whore. She lives outside the church, so oaths are meaningless to her. I warn you only so you will be cautious. The matter of the pope’s messages is too important to be overshadowed by a whore’s smile.”

“I do not think her likely to smile at me,” Bell said, smiling himself. “She was not pleased to see my admiration.”

“Perhaps. Nonetheless, have a care.”

* * * *

Bell found Magdalene fully veiled again, looking out into the hall. He picked up his cloak and swung it over his shoulders, feeling her watching from behind the veil. She did not speak, though, only nodded when he asked if she was ready to go, and walked by his side in silence until they were out on the road.

Then she said in an utterly colorless voice, “I hope you remember that I have already told the bishop the whole tale. I doubt you will find any more in it than I have or discover anything new, but if you do, there is nothing I would want kept secret from his lordship.”

“If you are telling me not to expect to be bribed, you can save your breath. The bishop pays me very well. I live at his expense. There is nothing you could offer me that would induce me to violate his trust.”

“Nothing?” Magdalene asked, and then laughed. “Most men have a price, but be assured I am not seeking yours.”

“I suppose I am not better than most other men, but my price, even on matters less dear to my heart, is not so low as a futtering or two. Baldassare was a friend, and neither gold nor kisses and caresses will turn me aside from seeking out the one who harmed him.”

“I am glad of that,” Magdalene said, her voice suddenly warm and lively. “Until the murderer is exposed, my women and I will be suspect. That is not only dangerous but, in the end, would be very bad for business. I promise you that if you seek earnestly for Messer Baldassare’s murderer, you will have all the help that I and my women can give.”

She went on then and told him the story she had told the bishop, the exact truth as far as she remembered it, except for finding the pouch and hiding it in the church. She ended with another assurance of her desire to help uncover the killer.

“Good enough,” Bell said neutrally. “But I think the first step is for us to make certain that the dead man
is
Baldassare. Why do you think it is? You say you never saw the body.”

“Because Sabina recognized him. I told you.”

“That seems clear enough. If she recognized him, why should you have any doubts? Because it was night and dark?”

‘The darkness would not matter. I must have forgot to say: Sabina is blind. But she was frightened out of her wits—”

“Sabina is blind? If she is blind, how could she recognize anyone?”

“By feel, of course.”

“You mean she opened the corpse’s braies and felt his—

“Do not be disgusting!” Magdalene snapped. “She recognized the feel of his clothes. She found the knife in his neck when she was trying to touch his face to be sure. She was terrified. That was why I wondered if it might have worked the other way; that is, Sabina found a dead man and was so frightened that she became sure it was a man with whom she had lain and so she would be blamed.”

“I suppose that is possible, but why should she think she would be blamed?”

“Is there anything for which a whore is not blamed? And there she was, kneeling by the body, her hands covered in blood. Who would believe she had not struck the blow?” Remembered terror and bitterness made her voice shrill, and she took a breath and brought it back to its even tenor. “What would it matter that there was no reason for us to harm him? For want of a better reason, Brother Paulinus is convinced we murdered poor Messer Baldassare just to prevent him from ridding himself of sin by confession, and he did not even know that Sabina had been anywhere near the body.”

Had she once been accused of murder, Bell wondered, having felt her bitterness. Had William of Ypres saved her? If so, it would be no wonder that she was grateful to him. And then a small frisson ran down his back. Had she committed the murder of which she was accused?

“Be that as it may,” Bell said quickly, “I think we had better first make sure the dead man
is
Baldassare.”

Since Magdalene could not reveal that they had found Baldassare’s pouch, and in it, letters of introduction and credit bearing his name, she simply agreed. She reminded Bell, however, that if she admitted that Baldassare had been in her house, Brother Paulinus would immediately have fuel for his fires of accusation, which would make trouble for the bishop. Thus, the monks probably would not let her into the chapel to look at the body. But Bell had the answer for that; when Brother Godwine, the porter, did object to Magdalene’s entering the priory grounds, Bell said he had been instructed by the bishop to bring her to view the dead man so she could say whether or not the man had been one of her clients.

Since Henry of Winchester was serving as administrator of the London diocese until a new bishop could be elected, Brother Godwine could do no more than make a sour face, but he said to Bell while he led them to the chapel in which the body was laid out, “That man did
not
come through the gate into the priory, nor did his horse. Only three men on horseback came through the front gate. I know them all, and all three horses were in the stable when this man’s beast was found in the graveyard. I am not mistaken or derelict in my duty, and I shall so tell the prior when he returns.”

Bell glanced at Magdalene, but she said nothing and her face was invisible behind the veil. Her mind had been working frantically, however, since he had insisted she accompany him, trying to find a compromise between her need to admit she knew Baldassare and her need to protect herself from Brother Paulinus. Necessity lends agility to the mind; as soon as the face of the dead man became visible, the right words came to her lips.

“Oh, my God!” Magdalene exclaimed. “No, he was not a regular client, but he has indeed been in my house. He came to my gate yesterday not long before Vespers and asked for the church of St. Mary Overy. I told him he must go around, but he protested that the church looked very near. I had come out without a cloak and I was cold, so I bade him step into the house, which he did while I explained that we were not part of the priory. But I did mention the back gate went to the church. I did not see where he went when he left the house.”

“But you told the sacristan the man had never been with you,” Brother Godwine said severely.

“I told the sacristan that all of our clients had left our house safe and sound and that neither I nor any other member of the household followed or harmed any client. I told the truth then, and I have told the truth now.”

Bell looked at her sidelong. He knew both tales and suspected that every word she had said was true—and added up to a thumping lie. Clever. Yes, she was clever.

“We will see,” Bell said, and then to Brother Godwine. “I know the man. His name was Baldassare de Firenze, and he often served as a papal messenger.”

“Papal messenger!” the porter echoed, his eyes filled with horror. “How terrible! What can he have been carrying that he should ask for the church of St. Mary Overy? We have made no recent request of the pope.”

Hardly listening to the horrified effusions, Bell bent over the neatly folded pile of clothes and other possessions that were on a small bench by the foot of the bier. The upper part of the shirt, tunic, and cloak were stained, despite washing; the braies were not. On the belt, laid atop the clothing, was a sheathed knife with a horn hilt inlaid with gold wire—a valuable knife, not taken. Beside that was a coiled leather strap about two or three fingers wide.

“Look,” Bell said, pointing to a fresh-looking cut in the leather of the belt. “That is where the loop of the purse was cut.” Then he lifted the coiled strap. Midway along, it was stained with blood. “He was wearing that when he died, likely to support a pouch. Did you find a pouch?”

“No,” Brother Godwine said firmly. “No purse either. You say the purse was stolen? Oh, heaven! What a calamity! Was the pouch stolen, too? Will we ever learn what the Holy Father wished to tell us?”